In the eyes and minds of Black America the two professions of medicine and law sit at the apex of respect, envy, and essentiality – as well they should. In my book, African American Architects: Embracing Culture and Building Urban Communities, 2020 (and several published summarizing articles) I alluded cryptically to the issue of Black architects and our subconscious wish that Black America (and particularly Black youth) see our profession as being as equally essential and prestigious as they see the medical and legal professions. I wish to explore here whether this is a viable aspiration. 

In Black America the mention of architects in proximity to MDs and Lawyers applies only in a prestige ranking. On the scale of “the 25 most desirable paying jobs,” medical doctors are still at the top. Lawyers are in the bottom fourth tier. Architects (who do not rank in the $100,000 annual salary paying category) also do not make the list of the top 25 most desirable jobs in the eyes of Black America. 

A bit of historical background perspective on the development of the three professions is in order. In 1895, the year that Booker T. Washington was giving his famous accommodationist speech in Atlanta, the National Medical Association (NMA) was also founded. There were already hundreds of Black doctors. There were a dozen Black medical schools (before being reduced to two after the 1910 Flexnor Report that revolutionized medical education). The essence of the Black doctor’s declared mission remains intact to this day - The elimination of the health disparities of Black Americans. 

Just 30 years later, the National Bar Association (NBA) was founded. At the time of that 1925 NBA founding there were over 1,000 Black lawyers in the U.S. thanks mainly to the 1869 founding of a law school at Howard University in Washington, DC. The Black lawyer’s mission was as clear and compelling as the medical doctors’ mission; the acquiring of civil rights, civil liberties, and constitutional protections for Black Americans. 

In stark contrast to the Black doctor and lawyer, between 1895 and 1925 the idea of a “Black architect” was still undergoing invention. The first formally educated Black architect in the U.S. – MIT-trained Robert R. Taylor – was on the Tuskegee, Alabama campus during that 30-year period. Taylor and a small band of other formally trained Black architects were offering drawing courses. In reality, Taylor and his faculty architect recruits would be best characterized as master builders. The actual building of the Tuskegee campus required a fully integrated approach to design, construction, materials development, and finance capital. Interestingly, in 1907 a 13-year old Los Angeles paperboy, Paul R. Williams was exposed to the accomplishments of Sidney Pittman, one of the Tuskegee Institute architects.

The formal training of architects – as we understand that word today - in a historically Black university would not occur until 1934. That program at Howard University in Washington, DC was not accredited until 1951 by a then nationally authorized body. Black architects did not establish their own professional/fraternal organization – the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA) - until 1971. This was 76 years after the founding of the NMA by Black doctors, and 61 years after the founding of the NBA by Black lawyers. 

Black architects constrained their mission to alignment with the anodyne “gentleman architect” mission of the American Institute of Architects. Consider had that mission mirrored that of the medical doctor. Only a single word would have needed to be changed; the elimination of the wealth disparities of Black Americans. Interestingly, between 1890 and the 1934 founding of the program at Howard, that appears to have actually been the mission of the still small number of Tuskegee-trained or faculty affiliated master builder-architects.

Consider had that mission mirrored that of the medical doctor. Only a single word would have needed to be changed; 'the elimination of the wealth disparities of Black Americans'

Fast forward to today, 2020, and the issue of Black architects versus Black medical doctors. Clarity of mission and educational curriculum structure emerge as the key differences. To be clear, I see no value to be gained by challenging the current mission and structure of today’s rejuvenated NOMA. Similarly, for the extant architecture academy enterprise. Today’s 170 accredited first professional degree architecture programs have a continuing role to play in educating the next generation of Black architects. But that role must be supplemented by an apostate architect wing whose mission is as clear and as compelling as those of the Black doctors and lawyers. The apostate architect wing’s first order of business must be the establishing of new educational institutions and curricula – possibly as many as one dozen. Each would respect regional and ideological differences, e.g., pro or anti-capitalist, for- or non-profit, etc. but all united by a priority allegiance to the elimination of wealth disparities in Black America’s communal spaces.

A common short dictionary definition of an architect is a person who designs buildings and houses. An honest 21st century redefinition of the Black apostate architect would be a person who designs and produces buildings, housing, and communities. Several of America’s Traditionally White Institutions have already provided the reality that a well-grounded licensed architect can be produced in a four-year post-baccalaureate, non-architecture degree program. The apostate architect curricula structure needs to resemble the medical education curriculum model.

The by-products of such a curriculum must be persons who understand that they cannot expect to be “selected” by others, Black or white, to design/produce Black America’s housing and community facilities. That is a world that has rarely existed for Black architects (the “architect selection” paradigm is recognized as a dying proposition by a growing number of white and other architects of color). Black America’s need over the next several generations is for an apostate architect wing that is capable and motivated to play a vital role in the business of a wealth creation-centered community development through a wholistic approach to affordable housing production and related community facilities. Given the reality that ambitious Black people who could be interested in careers in architecture are not willing to take the architecture profession’s de rigueur vows of poverty, this repurposed doctor-lawyer curriculum model would also solve the architect’s unacceptably low compensation issue… to be continued.